Word Meaning

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• Word Meaning

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Word Meaning

• Two aspects of a word
• 1. formsound and spelling
• 2. contentmeaning
• cat /kæt/ a small four-legged animal with soft
  fur and sharp claws
• Word-meaning is what the word denotes.

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5.1 The Meanings of meaning

• Meaning is reference.

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5. 1. 1. Reference

• the meaning triangle

concept/idea
referent
reference
train /trein/
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5. 1. 1. Reference

• Meaning is reference.
• Reference is the connection between the word form
  and what the form refers to in the world.
• Reference is the relationship between language
  and the world.

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5.1.2 Concept

• Meaning is concept.

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5.1.2 Concept

• Meaning and concept are closely connected but not
  identical.
• Concept is beyond language.
• It is the result of human cognition, reflecting
  the objective world in the human mind.

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5. 1. 1. Concept

• the meaning triangle

concept/idea
referent
reference
train /trein/
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5.1.2 Concept

• Concept is universal to all men alike regardless
  of culture, race, language and so on, whereas
  meaning belongs to language, so is restricted to
  language use.

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5.1.2 Concept

• ??
• Frau
• femme

concept
language
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5.1.2 Concept

• ??
• (concept)
• much time many people
• much money many books
• much water many buildings

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5. 1. 3. Sense

• Meaning is sense.

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5. 1. 3. Sense

• Difference
• Reference is connected with language.
• Concept is beyond language.
• Sense is within the language.

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5. 1. 3. Sense

• Every word that has meaning has sense, but not
  reference.
• probable, nearly, and, if, but, yes
• pavementsidewalk
• palchum

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5. 1. 3. Sense

• So in most cases, when we talk about the meaning
  of a word, we actually mean sense.

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5.2 Motivation

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5.2 Motivation

• Motivation accounts for the connection between
  the linguistic symbol and its meaning.
• Since the relationship between the word-form and
  meaning is conventional and arbitrary, most words
  can be said to be non-motivated.

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5.2 Motivation

• But English does have words whose meanings can be
  reasonably explained to a certain extent.
• There are mainly four types of motivation.

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5. 2. 1. Onomatopoeic Motivation

• Words whose sounds suggest their meanings
  onomatopeic words
• Two types of words according to their sound
  similarity

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5. 2. 1. Onomatopoeic Motivation

• 1. Primary onomatopoeia
• bow wow ha ha
• ping-pong miaow
• cuckoo tick-tuck

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5. 2. 1. Onomatopoeic Motivation

• 2. Secondary onomatopoeia
• cockcrow
• duckquack
• frogcroak
• micesqueak
• horseneigh
• goatbleat

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5. 2. 2. Morphological Motivation

• Examples
• airmail mail by air
• reading-lamp lamp for reading
• miniskirt small skirt
• The morphological structure suggests the meanings
  of the words.

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5. 2. 2. Morphological Motivation

• BUT
• blackmail ? mail black in colour ??
• greenhand ? hand green in colour ??
• They are morphologically non-motivated.

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5. 2.3. Semantic Motivation

• Examples
• the tongue of the bell
• the mouth of the river
• The Yellow River is the cradle of Chinese
  civilization.
• These words are not used in their literal
  sense, but figurative meaning.

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5. 2.3. Semantic Motivation

• We can understand them because there is a kind of
  resemblance between the two.
• The figurative meaning is suggested by the
  literal meaning.

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5. 2. 4. Etymological Motivation

• Examples
• pen feather ? quill pen ? any writing tool
• ?bamboo hair ? modern writing tool
• quisling Quisling ? traitor
• braille Braille ? language for the blind
• The meanings are related to their origins.
• The meanings can be etymologically explained.

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5.3 Types of Meaning

• Word-meaning has different components.
• These different components can be called
  different types of meaning.

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5. 3.1. Grammatical and Lexical Meaning

• Grammatical meaning
• Examples
• ?singular and plural meaning of nouns
• ?countable and uncountable
• ?tense meaning of verbs and their inflectional
  forms
• ?transitive and intransitive

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5. 3.1. Grammatical and Lexical Meaning

• Grammatical meaning show grammatical concepts or
  relationships.
• What is left of the meaning of a word is the
  lexical meaning.
• Lexical meaning is the basic meaning of the word,
  which is listed in the dictionary.

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5. 3.1. Grammatical and Lexical Meaning

• Characteristics
• 1. Different lexical items, which have different
  lexical meanings, may have the same grammatical
  meaning
• tables, men, oxen, potatoes

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5. 3.1. Grammatical and Lexical Meaning

• 2. The same word may have different grammatical
  meaning
• forget, forgets, forgot, forgotten,
  forgetting

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5. 3.1. Grammatical and Lexical Meaning

• grammatical meaning
• word-meaning
• lexical meaning

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5. 3.1. Grammatical and Lexical Meaning

• conceptual meaning(CM)
• lexical meaning
• associative
  meaning(AM)

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5. 3. 2 Conceptual and associative meaning

• Conceptual meaning (denotative meaning) is the
  meaning given in the dictionary and forms the
  core of word-meaning.
• Associative meaning is the secondary meaning
  supplemented to the conceptual meaning.

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5. 3. 2 Conceptual and associative meaning

• Compare
• CM AM

fundamental
secondary
universal
contextual
changing/ open-ended/ indeterminate
stable
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5. 3. 2 Conceptual and associative meaning

• Associative meaning may change according to
  contextual factors such as
• social background,
• role relationship,
• culture,
• age,
• sex,
• time, etc.)

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5. 3. 2 Conceptual and associative meaning

• connotative M
  (ConM)
• stylistic M (SM)
• affective M (AfM)
• collocative M (ConM)

associative M
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5. 3. 2 Conceptual and associative meaning

• 1. Connotative meaning
• Definition
• Connotative meaning refers to the overtones or
  associations suggested by the conceptual meaning,
  traditionally known as connotations.

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5. 3. 2 Conceptual and associative meaning

• Example dragon
• Chinese Western

violence
power
monster
prosperity
killing
good fortune
royalty
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5. 3. 2 Conceptual and associative meaning

• Be a man.
•   strength
• decisiveness
• wisdom
• courage
• etc.

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5. 3. 2 Conceptual and associative meaning

• 2. Stylistic meaning
• The stylistic meaning of a word is its stylistic
  feature formal, informal, neutral.
• Examples
• room chamber
• finish complete
• send dispatch
• try endeavour

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5. 3. 2 Conceptual and associative meaning

• Martin Joos five scales
• frozen
• formal
• consultative
• casual
• intimate

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5. 3. 2 Conceptual and associative meaning

• horse
• charger frozen
• steed formal
• horse consultative
• nag casual
• plug intimate

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5. 3. 2 Conceptual and associative meaning

• father, dad, daddy, pa, pappa,
• governor, male parent

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5. 3. 2 Conceptual and associative meaning

• 3. Affective meaning
• Affective meaning indicates the speakers
  attitude towards the person or thing in question.
  This meaning can be overtly and explicitly
  conveyed.
• love, hate, anger, happy

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5. 3. 2 Conceptual and associative meaning

• appreciative pejorative
• famous notorious
• determined pigheaded
• slim/slender skinny/bony/skeletal

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5. 3. 2 Conceptual and associative meaning

• 4. Collocative meaning
• The part of the word-meaning is reflected in the
  collocation.

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5. 3. 2 Conceptual and associative meaning

• Examples
• green on the job (inexperienced)
• green fruit (unripe)
• green with envy (envious)
• green-eyed monster (green colour)

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5. 3. 2 Conceptual and associative meaning
person

• 1. Every dog has his day.
• 2. Let sleeping dogs lie.
• 3. Love me, love my dog.

troubles
friend
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END